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« on: April 25, 2005, 01:23:48 PM »
I really didn't want to scan back through the last 1000+ post to see if this is posted, but apparently it is some bits and pieces of an interview from the latest EGM magazine retyped and posted from 1.com boards - this info collected on N-sider.com forums by Juno Reactor
Breaking news! As many of you already know, the next issue of EGM will feature a "blow-out" cover story on the new Zelda. As it turns out, some people across the Internet have already received their copy (mainly subscribers in the Ziff-Davis area of California, where it's already circulating)! The new details revealed are quite promising. They include:
There will be no voice acting. Hurray for written text!
There will be no GBA connectivity. I liked the Tingle Tuner, but alas...
Fishing returns! You can "angle" for fishies in the beautiful new waters!
Artwork of Princess Zelda depicts her wielding a blade
The storyline involves both Zelda AND Ganon; part of the story involves Link rescuing Zelda
No official title has been decided upon yet (as of press time)
"Chicken gliding" with the cuccos is back!
Link is a cowboy at the game's beginning; there's a minigame to teach horseback riding
Many positively gushing Tauro Village impressions; "great sense of realism," "grand in scale"
Horseback battles, including equestrian boss battles, will be plentiful
Combat in Zelda '05 will be different from, and enhanced over, TWW
Also, the U.K. Gamecube magazine "Cube" had an excerpt of what they claim is the official opening premise for the game's story. They said:
"The storyline of the new Legend of Zelda seems to be a simple case of good versus evil. While the dark of the night has always been home to evil, just recently something has empowered the ghouls and undead of the world to venture into the light; in extreme circumstances, groups of winged demons have been terrorizing the farms and villages that line the open plains of Hyrule. Link's mission is to get to the bottom of what's empowering these demons before they completely dominate the land. We're guessing that Ganondorf will have a hand in this one, but there's no sign of him at this early stage."
Another hot tip about the storyline jives well with this, saying that when Link sees the Triforce appear on his hand (as seen in the Hobby Consolas screenshots), he realizes his destiny and sets off to search for the fiend behind the rising tides of darkness. Then, for the beginning of the game, he fights to rescue Zelda from Ganon, only for a catastrophic event to occur that takes him on a far greater quest. Such is the rumor from alledged "insider" sources, but it sounds reasonable considering recent revelations.
On another note, I suspect Tauro Village will be the official English name for the farming community Link calls home. It sounds like "toro," the Spanish word for bull, a fitting term for a village filled with horned blue cows.
More EGM details! This time, taken from the IGN Boards, which in turn took it from the 1up.com Boards. Stevo18 wrote this, though I edited it for ease of reading, since the original was plagued by bad grammar and spelling (and in a way could still be better):
Chicken gliding is back, and it looks just as silly as I'd imagined it would, in a "realistic" Zelda. Fishing also makes a comeback, and from the sounds of it looks every bit as delightful as you could possibly imagine.
Also, Link receives a wooden sword early on in the game, and learns combat skills through a familiar scarecrow-bashing tutorial. It sounds like the OoT and MM scarecrows will make a return appearance this way.
Now at the beginning of the game, Link is a young cowboy living in a small rural community called Toaru Village. Now this town is NOT in Hyrule; rather, it's located a long way away from Hyrule. The people of Toaru raise cows to sell to the kingdom of Hyrule, and the two places share a friendly relationship with one another.
There are several other villages, and every year the kingdom of Hyrule gathers them all together for a kind of festival where all of the people can communicate with one another. As part of the tradition, the chief of the village is supposed to attend the festival, but this time around, the chief orders Link to go instead.
On the way to the festival, Link encounters some kind of accident, which eventually leads him to the main adventure...
Some interview excerpts:
EGM: Will this Zelda be about rescuing the princess again?
Eiji Aonuma: Yes, the story will involve Zelda, and the story will involve Ganon, but of course the plot won't be identical to those in past Legend of Zeldas.
EGM: Where does this Zelda fit in the overall series timeline?
EA: I can't really go into that, partially because I want to keep it a secret, but also because we haven't decided yet. There are some kinds of...unstable, uncertain ideas we're working on. Depending on what course we choose in terms of developtment, the final ending may change.
EGM: Is it safe to say there is some major gameplay element we still don't know about, like the sailboat in Wind Waker, that will remain secret until just before the game comes out?
bA: You're right. (laughs)
EGM: Is that why the game name still doesn't have a subtitle? Will the full name give something away?
EA: We really don't know what we're going to do with the subtitle at this point. It could work the other way around--maybe there will be some kind of mystery about the title, and somewhere in the course of the gameplay, you'll realize it's meaning.
EGM: From what we've played, the combat feels exactly like Windwaker-we noticed you can still smash shields, knock off helmets, etc. Do you have any changes planned?
EA: Remember how in Wind Waker, if the enemy comes within a certain range of Link and you press the A button at the right time, sometimes Link will do a special attack? We think that worked very well, so we're thinking about intensifying that aspect with this game. We've already added some things, like a jumping downward stab. We're going to incorporate more of those cool-looking performances and a few other changes. People are going to see that this game is pretty different from Wind Waker.
EGM: Besides combat and the graphics, how else will this game be different from Wind Waker?
EA: About the setting, in Wind Waker it was the ocean. I really cannot tell you what kind of setting we're going to adapt for this new Zelda, but I can say we are really trying to expand the sense of scale. Before, whenever we made 3D games, we shied away from using too many big objects. If they aren't necessary for specific gameplay ideas, they become a kind of obstacle. But in this game, we are trying to be more realistic. In this horse-riding battle, you can see it takes place on a huge land, even if it's mostly empty landscape. That's why we need the horse from the very begining of the game. We want people to feel that this is a huge land they're playing in, and without a horse, it's impossible for you to explore. Also, sometimes you're going to see something that's just vast, even though it's not involved in gameplay--something huge or something very tall. We want to realize that sense of awe by presenting things realistically.
EGM: I know you got so many questions about the graphics for Wind Waker and now this new Zelda--do you get tired of talking about the graphics all the time?
EA: No. After all, I have a designer's background myself, so I know how important the visuals are. A change in graphics can give a perfectly different impression to game userI know all about this. But I should say it's not very easy for me to explain why we use this visual style here, why we use that graphical style in other games. I'm kind of forced to make some reasonable, rational background explanation in order to persuade people to understand why this is better than the others. It's not very easy. In my mind it's the emotions you get from one visual that are different from another(style). Whenever we work on a game, we have (lots of) internal discussions about what kind of graphical style we need to adapt. Graphics are very important.
EGM: Looking back, what do you think about the reaction to Wind Waker's cartoon-style graphics?
EA: I know that before the game shipped, there were many debates and arguments about the graphic style. But as soon as we launched Wind Waker, and people started to play with it, they said: "We understand now. This is the reason you used this graphical style this time." Likewise, we're very hopeful that when we launch this new Zelda game, people are going to appreciate it without any further questions and think, "OK, that makes sense."
EGM: True, once most people actually play Wind Waker, the visuals don't bother them, but do you think a lot of people never even picked it up just because of how it looked?
EA: Well, yes, that's unfortunate, but it's true that with graphics... people like certain graphics, and people don't like certain graphics. It's very clear for each different individual. So we're sorry for that, but what I can tell you is, we are pretty confident that we were right about the cartoon approach for Wind Waker. Without that approach, we couldn't tell enough about the story. So whenever people have some doubts, all I can say is-this is a very japanese expression--"You may think it's a trick, but try it and see."
EGM: Let's move on to things we've seen in the two video trailers you've released so far. What's with all the cats, for example?
EA: We're thinking of incorporating some ideas where Link can communicate with animals, one way or another. I can't elaborate on specifically how. But the reason you can pick up cats early in the game in Toaru Village, for example, is because we wanted people to understand you can touch the cats, you can play with them. After leaving that impression, it'll become easier for us as developers to have complex ideas afterward, where the players are willing to approach the animals.
EGM: What about where all the ghosts appear? Is that link using the Lens of Truth item to see invisible stuff?
EA: You may be right-it's one of those mechanics where, after solving riddles, what's invisible can become visible. But once again, I can't elaborate on how that works in that specific case. Please look foward to the actual game. (smiles)
EGM: And that shadowy figure on our cover with his or her back to Link?
EA: Very sorry, but we'd like to keep it secret. People can take your cover as a big mystery. We're not sure when we want to break that infomation--maybe at the next E3 show in May, or maybe not. As a hint, you can also see a kind of castle in the background scenery...
EGM: Wind Waker had a fantastic connectivity feature where a second player could play on a Game Boy Advance hooked up to the Gamecube to help Link. Are you planning anything similar for this Zelda?
EA: Well, I liked the connectivity in Wind Waker very much, and I'm hopeful that we can create that kind of play experience for other games. What's cool about Wind Waker's connectivity is that you can get some additional information on a real-time basis. Even though it may not be "real" realtime, somehow we may be able to reproduce a similar game experience. Maybe a second character in this new Zelda can get access to certain information and help the main player. As far as the character that the other player controls--Tingle--I found out some American people didn't like him very much. So we need to think about what kind of character we're going to use. (laughs)
EGM: So would this new system use the same GBA-GC Link cable setup?
EA: No, we really want everything to be realized with a Gamecube and a disc, nothing else. With connectivity, the downside is you need the Link cable and you need the GBA. For those who don't have everything, the idea of creating something through connectivity, even if it's very good, is pointless. So what I'm thinking is, maybe we can reproduce a similar gaming experience without the cable or GBA.
EGM: In the movie trailer and on our cover, we see a wolf howling-can you tell us anything about that? There's some speculation maybe Link is a werewolf...
EA: Hmm...sorry, confidential.
Well, that's as far as I'm typing, as far as the interview itself is concerned. I want to fill you guys in on the actual hands-on stuff:
Hands-On Report - Part One: TOARU VILLAGE
Ah, the tranquil hamlet that kicks off nearly every Zelda game. The one thing that stands out about Toaru Village (Japanese for "unspecified"--the English name is to be determined) is, like everything in this new Zelda, the sense of realism. And we aren't just talking about the graphics: townspeople go about their business, cats and chickens wander here and there (one attacking the other if they get too close), birds scatter out of the tall grass as Link approaches... The sense of scale is impressive; maybe it's just a reaction to Wind Waker's squat characters, but everything seemed taller, bigger, more spread out.
As in the last game, Link starts out without a weapon or his trademark green outfit. "If someone happened to see this scene without knowing what game it is," says Aonuma," they probably wouldn't even guess it was Link in The Legend of Zelda." Upon closer inspection, however, one detail is a dead giveaway: on the back of Link's left hand are three dark triangles--Zelda's Triforce symbol.
"Stick it to 'em"- Eventually Link gets a wooden sword and learns combat in a familiar scarecrow-bashing tutorial. As before, the L trigger locks on targets and B performs different attacks, depending on the direction of the analog stick. But if you don't lock on you can now swipe your sword as you move around, without stopping (handy for clearing tall grass, no doubt), and Link has a special coup de grace: press A for a jumping downward thrust to finish off enemies you've knocked over.
"At home on the Range"-- Another early minigame teaches the player how to ride horseback. As in previous games, you can simply push in the direction you want to go for a slow trot or hit A to apply the whip for a burst of speed. You can also see where "Cowboy Link" (Aonuma's name for our hero before he earns his green duds) gets his name--the goal here is to round up and force all the grazing animals into the barn before time runs out. It's a little tougher than you might think.
"Flying the coup"- Good news: Chicken-gliding is back! Just grab one of your fine-feathered friends, find a tall building or cliff, and jump off--Link floats slowly down, which enables him to reach areas he couldn't otherwise. This technique came in handy during our demo: a pregnant woman asked Link to retrieve a baby basket on the other side of an otherwise unscalable fence. After getting it, he slowly (move too fast and you'll be scolded) escorts her back to her home with it. What a guy!
Hands-On Report- Part 2: BOSS FIGHT!
"Horseback Attack"- Horseback riding has an expanded role in this new Zelda--as Aonuma tells us, fast transportation is basically a requirement from the very start of the game because of larger environments. The second scene we played proved his point with a full-speed boss fight; Link chased down this big-horned baddie atop his bigger-horned steed, first slashing him to remove his armor, and then pelting him with arrows. A very cool and very challenging concept for a boss.
"Fighting The Horde"--Other mobile enemies swarmed Link, trying to distract him from his true target. Horseback combat felt smooth and natural; as always, you can lock on to targets or go into first person and aim manually, slinging arrows with X (or the R trigger for exploding bomb arrows). Link's head tracked nearby foes, and he pivots in whatever direction you point to attack with his sword. He could also dismount anytime and the enemies would circle, making passes until he knocked them off their battle-boars or killed them right in the saddle. (Aonuma told us that in the final game, Link can even steal some of the bad guy's rides.)
The scenery was lovely--rolling hills with the shadows of clouds floating past--but sparse, with only a fence now and then to break things up. Then again, most of our attention was on the enemies--seven or eight (counting thier boars) on screen at once, without a hint of slowdown.
"Steeple Chase"-- As in the earlier cattle-driving minigame, you can make Link's steed trot in any direction by pushing on the analog stick. You can also whip his horse with the A button for a boost (an action again limited to six times, with a corresponding meter that slowly regenerates). Speed is important; unless Link is moving fast enough to automatically jump over the same wooden fences the boss leaps over, he'll slam into them and stop completely. So that's three things you need to worry about: Keeping up with the boss, attacking him, and avoiding his minions.
Last but not least, I want to mention the beautiful drawing of Princess Zelda holding a sword, and three sketch drawings of Link's different emotions, assuring me that this part of the game isn't being overlooked.
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Hope you guys enjoy, I personally didn't read it cause I don't want the game to feel familiar to me before I have even played it.
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